The Extended Case Files
by alikat522
Summary: This is an assortment of one-shots and drabbles from throughout Sherlock, a mix and match of pairings and characters and timelines.
1. Efficient Breeding

John first noticed Sherlock doing it when he had dropped a test tube underneath the couch. After blindly grabbing for it for a minute, he had tossed a carrot underneath the couch and waited until Redchime ran after it to continue the search.

"…Are you using the rabbit as a flashlight?"

"It's efficient."

That became his go-to excuse for it. Turning on the lights when he wanted a late night cup of tea was too much work, so he'd just walk around with the rabbit under his arm. He'd position the cage by his chair when he wanted to read and balance the hutch on the toilet when he turned the loo into a darkroom and tried to develop film in the tub.

John declared it too much when he found Sherlock updating his website in the dark, rabbit balanced on his head.

"It's bad for your eyes. Do I need to send Redchime back to Kirsty?"

"He is a gift from a client; I do not wish to be rude."

"When has that ever stopped you before?"

Of course, John ended up eating his words during the next week's storm and subsequent power outage. Sometimes a glowing rabbit was just useful.


	2. I Don't Think With My Sex Organs, Do You

The look in her eyes assures him he is right. Up until the charges blast the top few layers of skin off his hand.

"Sherlocked? I am sorry to disappoint, but not everyone here thinks with their sex organs. Some of us have enough blood to work our brains at the same time."

She leans forward, and his thoughts are temporarily wiped out, even the pain of the burnt phone husk in his palm. All washed away in the light cloud of her perfume. She rests her cheek against his and whispers.

"Only half-right, Mr. Holmes."

And without another word to either brother, Miss Adler is gone.


	3. IM Suicide Notes

(A/N: Written pre-Reichenbach, this is an AU for how Sherlock and John's last conversation might have gone.)

-/-

-/-

To: JW

From: SH

You are not an idiot. You are a brilliant man.

-SH

-/-

To: SH

From: JW

Where r u?

-/-

To: JW

From: SH

Brilliant in all senses of the word.

-SH

-/-

To: SH

From: JW

Sherlock, this isn't funny. Where did you go?

-/-

To: JW

From: SH

I apologize for all possible pain I have brought you.

-SH

-/-

To: SH

From: JW

Stop trying to wax poetic and tell me where you are.

-/-

To: JW

From: SH

You have been a better friend to me than I could ever deserve.

-SH

-/-

To: SH

From: JW

Don't fuck with me. Where are you?

-/-

To: JW

From: SH

You have my respect, my friendship, and my love.

-SH

-/-

To: JW

From: SH

Always.

-SH

-/-

To: SH

From: JW

WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?

-/-

To: JW

From: SH

Goodbye, John.

-Sherlock

He tosses the phone out of the cab window. It cracks on the pavement and is promptly run over by another car. He doesn't watch it break. This is something you don't go back from.

-/-

To: SH

From: JW

Sherlock, please. Tell me where you are. I can help.

-/-

To: SH

From: JW

Don't do this. You don't have to do this alone.

-/-

To: SH

From: JW

Sherlock. Please.


	4. Glowy Red Eye in the Sky

Jim beamed as he handed over the plastic Spider-man lunchbox.

"I made you a tuna sandwich this time. It should be cold enough out for it to stay good until lunch. And I gave you an extra banana, because you need the potassium to keep your hands steady. Don't eat the brownie first."

Sebastian resisted the urge to roll his eyes, but this was just getting ridiculous. At first it had started with a sandwich in a bag when Jim asked him to do an all night stake-out, and Seb had thought it was a nice touch. It showed a level of casual concern for his employees that could really help out a crime boss; it made everyone feel that they had a personal stake in the success of the operation. But apparently Jim just liked feeding Seb, because he was the only one to get increasingly complicated lunches.

He took the proffered box and stuffed it into his duffle bags, along with all the disassembled pieces of his rifle. Hopefully no one would wonder where the homeless man begging for change got the Spider-man box; he didn't need Jim's eccentricities ruining his cover. Jim leaned over and planted a quick peck on Seb's cheek.

"Thank you, darling. You're so sweet; I bet your eyes taste like caramel. Now go shoot some people for me!"  
>Seb actually did roll his eyes this time, but only when he had his back turned. He did miss the decorum of the military sometimes, like the knowledge that a superior officer was unlikely to either kiss you or steal your eyes. But he took the bad with the good, and working for Jim did have its perks. The army had this real hang-up about using civilians for target practice.<p>

He headed out for work, and had a fairly uneventful day. A lot of sitting on rooftops and watching people. That's what snipers always did, but this time he didn't get to pull the trigger, so he just ended up feeling like a gargoyle. Around noon, he opened the lunchbox, speculating about whether Jim just packed his lunch so that Seb wouldn't have to leave his post all day.

The tuna sandwich didn't actually have any bread, so it was just a blob of tuna, lettuce and tomato wrapped in plastic. The first banana had a syringe jammed in the middle of it, but the second was safe. The yogurt cup had a smiley face painted on the top. The brownie was full of glass, but big enough pieces to avoid. A typical Jim lunch.

And of course, the note. Seb wanted to hunt down and strangle whichever shop owner had sold a grown man My Little Pony stationary. The note had the usual tone to it.

"Dear Sebbie,

I hope you like this little lunch I made you! I want to make sure that my glowy red eye in the sky always has lots of nutrition when he goes out to kill for me. I don't think I tell you this enough, but I love your hands. I want to cut off all the skin and tendons and wear them as stylish gloves. If you fail me, I will make a whole suit out of you, and people will salute me and call me Colonel.

I'm making chicken for dinner, so don't be late.

Mwah mwah mwah, lots of kisses,

Jim"


	5. Honey and Dead Things

"…Really? _Really_? You thought the best place for them was in the bathroom?"

"Flat expanses in a closed area with full control over light conditions. I don't see where in the flat would be better."

"Oh, I don't know, maybe in your own damn bedroom!"

"Have you ever tried to get honey out of carpeting? No, the bathroom counters are much easier."

"So these are honey bees? When I want to get a dog, you say it'll be too much mess, but you have full leave to make the entire flat sticky?"

"Dogs are filthy animals that ruin a house in minutes. Besides, these aren't pets, they are test subjects. I need to more closely study pollen distribution in the area, which starts with studying some of the main distributers of said pollen."

"Sherlock, I put up with the corpse bits in the fridge, but I'm not tolerating bees in the bathroom as well. If the bees stay, I'm throwing out all of the dead things in the kitchen. If you want to keep the dead things, the bees go."

"Hmm. I can't keep all of my experiments at Bart's, they need careful monitoring. What if I keep both, but contained to one room?"

"Your bedroom?"

"No no, that wouldn't work at all. I could keep the bees on the kitchen table, although it would run a greater risk of them escaping into the entire flat. If I routinely buy ice, the temperature-controlled specimens could go in the bathtub. Which would you prefer?"

"…I am going out. I'm going down to the shelter, and the next time you see me, I will have a puppy."

"What? No no no, John, you can't, John, come back here-"

-/-

-/-

"So you see Mrs. Hudson, that's why I have a bulldog now."

"Oh, but isn't he a sweet one. What's his name then?"

"Gladstone. And it's actually worked out well; Sherlock's so busy teaching him to smell the differences between different chemicals, he didn't even notice when I opened the bathroom window."


	6. I Should Have Worn Heels

(A/N: This fic is in response to the prompt "When Molly asks what he needs, Sherlock asks for a hug")

-/-

-/-

Oh, wow, okay, this is actually happening. Wow he is tall, I kind of wish I had worn heels today. But those always kill my feet and I've had so much back and forth for the lab-work that I definitely would have snapped one and oh, Sherlock Holmes is actually hugging me. Hurry up, put your arms around him! This has to be the best hug he's ever had.

I never realized just how skinny he was before. But he's warmer than I thought (not that I thought about it all that much). He ends up looking like he's made of marble half the time, but he's actually really warm.

His chin's jamming into my neck. Gah, no, I can't pull away, he needs this and I can't be the one to pull away. Just deal with it, Molly. This is what you always dreamed about, isn't it? Being held by Sherlock? Well, you've got it now, so stop worrying about his chin.

Is he comfortable, all bent over like this? I'd need to stand on a chair to hug him properly. Or lie down on a bed, wait, no, this is a serious moment. This isn't about him as a crush, this is about him as a friend…if he was telling the truth about that. He's lied to me so many times before, and I just can't handle it if he's putting on the act again, not with everything that's going wrong today.

But he asked for this hug. And it's not like that kiss after the gift, where he felt like he had to, because I already went and said I'd do anything for him and I know I would, too. It's why I'm standing here on my tiptoes with a chin jammed into my neck. (Hmm, if I shift a little, I can get it at least on to my shoulder, and there, that doesn't hurt as much.)

He probably wishes John was the one doing this. I kind of do, too. I mean, I like him and all, I'm glad to do this, but it should be John here. For both of them.

He's letting go now, right? That's him letting go? Oh Lord, just look at his eyes. He needed that really badly. No, that wasn't a "trying to pull one over on Molly to mess with her" hug. That was a "I'm scared and I need someone" hug. I guess he does have those in him. God, Molly, don't start crying. The last thing he needs is your tears.

He's looking at me. Keep it together, girl.

"…Thank you, Molly Hooper."

"No trouble. It's what friends are for."

"But I do have something else I need you to do…"


	7. The Opportune Hammer

Anderson tosses him a blanket and points to the couch.

"That's the only blanket you're getting, the couch doesn't fold out, and you better be gone in the morning."

Sherlock smirks, still standing in his blood-soaked coat in the middle of Anderson's flat.

"I don't suppose Mrs. Anderson would appreciate me still being here."

"Oh, shut it. You know she's gone, so just shut your mouth."

"Of course. I will not say a single thing about the level of dust on the bureau with the family pictures, or the cheap jewelry that was displaced when she took all of her good things with her."

"I swear, I will drag you back to Bart's and toss you off a second time. And there'll be no truck waiting and no bags of blood this time."

"Oh yes, your vital contribution to the events earlier. Which only incidentally had to be directed, planned, and ultimately executed by me."

"Don't even pretend, you prick. There's no way in hell you would have come to me if you could have done it alone."

"I could have found Molly."

"You wouldn't want to put up with her crying, squeaky little thing she is. No, you needed someone who couldn't care either way if you lived or died. Someone who absolutely relished the idea of you leaving London for the foreseeable future."

"Then thank the fates that we were brought together, as if I had come across a particularly opportune hammer on the side of the road."

"Oh yes, we all pale before the almighty detective. You're always going to be smarter than me, aren't you? Smarter than Lestrade? Smarter than Sally?"

Sherlock's retort dies in his throat upon seeing the new anger in Anderson's eyes. Anderson continues, stepping closer to Sherlock and glaring deep into his eyes.

"Don't come back, do you understand me? This is Sally's chance to actually make something of herself, step out of Lestrade's shadow, and the last thing she needs is her big case undermined because you can't keep your massive brain out of everyone's faces."

Sherlock holds Anderson's gaze.

"I will return to John eventually. Once everything has been done that needs to be done."

"Fine, I don't care, go play detectives with your pet doctor all you like. Just do it outside London; do it quietly. Cut your damn hair and buy a different coat, get a less stupid name, anything. Just don't ruin this for Sally."

"…What changed your mind? Not standing by Sgt. Donovan anymore; that must be a significant step. People do tend to show loyalty to their romantic partners."

"Oh, yes, of course, I should be busy thinking with my silly little emotions while you are the pinnacle of reason. Don't be stupid. I am a man of science. I re-ran those tests you had back in your lab, and everything checked out. You even missed a few things."

"No I didn't!"

"Yes, you did! You work too fast, you're bound to make mistakes. But you would have bragged about every single thing there if you had faked it. Your ego is too bloody massive to let any point slip past the mortals."

"…So your faith in my arrogance assured you of my innocence?"

"I've taken your shit for too many years to think any different of you."

"I…thank you, Anderson. Or, I should say, thank you…actually, what is your first name?"

"Oh, fuck you. Go to bed and be out of here by morning, and don't get any more blood on the carpet. I need a clean start to my new, Holmes-free life."


	8. Keep on Trying Till You Run Out of Jam

(A/N: This fic is in response to the prompt "Baskerville is Aperture Laboratories". Contains spoilers for Portal 2)

-/-

-/-

"Sherlock, get back on the lift, now!"

"Listen to them! They're making music! Aren't you the least bit curious? What's its purpose? Is it a programmed response, or are they actually sentient guns? Oh I wish I had my violin here, I want to see how they would respond to added harmonies."

"The crazy robot told us to leave, and that's what we're going to do. I am sick and tired of being down here and I want to get back to London."

"John, not five minutes ago you held a gun in your hands that can rip holes in time and space and you want to go back to the cozy little flat and drink your tea and write on your blog? This is real science here, real invention! And all they want to do is test things!"

"And kill you."

"Yes, well that's why we have to be clever about it."

"Sherlock, what about Henry's case? You want to leave a case unsolved like that?"

"Frankland did it."

"What?"

"Yes, somehow. He used the word 'cell phone' and gave Henry some sort of drug. I put sugar in your coffee. It's not important now. Do you think the targeting systems for the turrets are permanently disabled, or does it alternate between a 'music' and a 'guard' setting?"

"What did you do to my coffee?"

"We've moved past that John, try to keep up. See if you can find a glowing rabbit and a Companion Cube. We've got some more tests to run!"


	9. Makes the Medicine Go Down

(Warning: Absolute crack.)

-/-

Mycroft eyed the man sitting across from him in his office in the Diogenes Club. This entire situation had created a stir, but one that had to be kept quiet; the other Club members were beginning to become annoyed with how many visitors he had had in one day. The man read from a thick report in his hands.

"She has not responded to any traditional methods of interrogation so far. Her answers tend to be curt and evasive, but not openly hostile yet. In fact, on a few occasions, she tried to break in to song in response to a line of inquiry. The doctor's have been on stand-by to sedate her when necessary."

"Yes, good choice. And the flying device?"

The man shifted under Mycroft's gaze.

"Well, sir, we have been trying to figure that out. Our technicians completely deconstructed it, but it honestly does seem to be a normal umbrella."

Mycroft clutched his hand around his own umbrella and leaned across his desk to watch the man.

"You mean to tell me that a woman claiming to be a nanny interfered with commercial flight paths using an umbrella?"

"Well, no sir, obviously not, sir. We just cannot…figure out what she did yet."

"Then I do not want to hear from you again until you have. Go."

The man scurried out of the office, closing the door behind him. Mycroft rubbed a hand across his jaw and scooped another spoonful of artificial sweetener into the cup of tea on his desk. Flying nannies. Really.

Of course, if they could figure out how to replicate her stealth flyer, Mycroft would be first in line to get one. He smiled wryly at the thought; being able to spy on all of London with his own eyes.


	10. Affectionate Glass Eyes

If Lestrade had not wandered into Sherlock's life, he never would have paid him mind. Lestrade was one of the little people, the normal people; the people who went about their lives without seeing the threads that surrounded them, connected them, and trapped them in cages they were not even aware of. Detective Inspector Gregory Samuel Lestrade, born May 21, 1963 to Richard Dennis Lestrade and Susanna Caroline Lestrade (nee Perry), would go about his life, do his job, make his small impact on the people directly surrounding him, and die. And Mycroft would not know or care.

Except that DI Lestrade had crashed into one of the people in London who actually did matter. An argument with a black haired junkie over the body of a street person had changed Lestrade's entire life. It had secretly given him meaning on a larger scale, and made him marginally more important than the general huddled, quivering masses of humanity that filled the streets like clots in otherwise orderly veins. Greg Lestrade began to matter to the country, and as with all things that mattered to the country, he began to matter to Mycroft Holmes.

At first, Mycroft watched him to see which way his interactions with his younger brother would go. Mycroft had tried for years to draw the poison out of Sherlock, once even going so far as to lock him in a room for weeks until he had detoxified. But even with all of his cameras, he could not follow the younger man all the time, and it seemed imprudent to keep him a permanent prisoner. But Lestrade could offer Sherlock something more valuable than any bribe or enticement Mycroft could manage: Lestrade could offer him a challenge: a chance to test his skills against the evils of society, to press his mind against other humans and see which would crack first. But Lestrade would only work with a clean detective. So Sherlock became a clean detective. In his own bumbling, blind way, Gregory Lestrade had done what a greater man could not.

If pressed on the issue (and if he had something to gain from the admission), Mycroft would admit that he had come to respect Lestrade for his actions. The numbers corresponding to the cameras that directly surrounded Lestrade (the ones by the Yard, the courthouse, his flat) found a way into Mycroft's personal memory bank, the carefully controlled bit of his mind that he set aside for otherwise un-sortable thoughts. He told himself that it was because of the emotional link to Sherlock; the association painted Lestrade with the same familial brush. He also knew that he was lying, and that lie was tucked away into the same folder.

He kept his associations with Lestrade to an absolute minimum. The occasional meeting to gauge how Sherlock was doing. The rare job specifically for him, something too emotionally and politically messy to send one of his own men to do. He kept a cool and official distance while talking to this man who had dragged the drugs out of his little brother's arms. A cold professionalism and the odd passing mention of extreme power and influence stopped Lestrade from developing any sort of familiarity. It was better for Mycroft that way, and as with all things that mattered to Mycroft, better for the country.

He remembered the number for every camera that followed Gregory Lestrade through his daily life. He did not check them any more than he did any other camera in the city, but it comforted him to remember they were there. His own personal eye on a little, tiny, insignificant man who just happened to be more important than he had any right to be.


	11. The Living Footnotes

I don't have a thing to be ashamed of. Not a damn thing. All of the evidence was pointing towards him, everything made sense if he was the culprit, and he even dove off a roof out of guilt. I did my job and I did it well, and I'll be damned if anyone is going to tell me differently.

Things are almost never that complicated. Do they really expect me to have taken criminal masterminds, elaborate schemes and triple bluffs into account? I'd end up a conspiracy nut, thinking like that, looking at every dead body like it is part of some huge web. I'd never solve as many cases as I do. And I do solve a lot, no matter what certain people might think.

John's going to hold it against me until the day I die, but that's to be expected. You could see from day one that he was hooked on him, trailing behind him like a limping little puppy. He had decided that Sherlock was innocent without looking at any of the facts, and you just can't solve crimes with your heart. Through no merit of his own, he turned out to be right.

Lestrade's upset with me, has been for three years now, but he at least has the decency to be subtle about it. He's retreated into himself, these few last years, constantly second-guessing his own work, looking over his shoulder for some brainiac to wander in and lay it all out clear as day. Before his anger was all turned inwards, mixed up with guilt about causing the death of a "friend". Now that the freak's back, I'm a better target, but Lestrade and I have our share of history. I've covered his back and he's covered mine. And he's too good a man to let me hang for this alone.

Darren doesn't talk about it much, although I can see him preparing for the backlash, bracing for a return to barked insults and casual shouts of "Anderson!" We stood together on the upswing of this whole debacle, and we'll be there for each other now. There's not even a wife in the picture to worry about now. Just us.

And him. Always him. When Sherlock Holmes makes his way into your life, it's not your life anymore. It becomes a tangent branching off from his story, a footnote in his novel. Years in the force, a struggle to gain the title of Sergeant, a constant battle to stand up against all of the shit that comes against you, it all gets swept away by a passing glance from his coattails. You become one dimensional, a side-character, the constant counterpoint to the only point that matters. Even for the three years I had free, the three years for me to remake my own name, his ghost hung over the Yard in Lestrade's empty eyes and Watson's constant visits. And now he's back in the flesh, a miracle worker who managed to survive. I should have known he was too permanent to kill.

I have nothing to be ashamed of. I have nothing I need to change. I did my job and I stand by my work. I don't run away from the consequences of my actions, like some people I know.

"Ah, Sgt. Donovan, how nice to see you again. Tell me, did Anderson buy you those earrings to celebrate your rise in prominence after the case of your career, or to celebrate my death? Either way, I sincerely hope that you kept the receipt."

"Hello again, Freak. See you haven't changed at all."

"I don't have to."

"And neither do I."


	12. Moments of Impact

The first time Sgt. Sally Donovan really acknowledged Darren Anderson, he was busy kicking a wall. She later found out that he had broken three toes at the time, but he didn't mention that until their fourth coffee date. That first time, though, was the first occasion when she had stopped and truly looked at this anonymous technician with the weird hair. She had seen him before, obviously, on a number of cases, and she had probably even spoken to him before. But he had been a tool, a conduit of evidence that aided her job, the source of numerous leads and warrants. Now he was a person, and an angry person at that.

He had noticed her, and recognized the similar expression on her face. Donovan had come to this alley, half a block away from the crime scene, for a reason. A tall, skinny, black haired, jack ass of a reason.

"Evening, Sergeant," he gasped out, still winded from his assault on the wall. "Nice night for it."

Maybe it was the way that he shared her anger, completely devoid of Lestrade's tolerant admiration. Maybe it was the fact that he used her formal, hard-earned title (one more "Sally" out of the Freak, and she was going to snap). Or maybe she just needed someone to commiserate with. But whatever the reason, Sally was charmed.

-/-

-/-

The first time Sally Donovan slept with Darren Anderson, he bashed the back of his head against her wall. She had made a move to help him, leaning forward in her position on his lap, but he just gasped out "No, I'm fine, I'm fine" and lunged back in to resume their kiss.

A bustling, anonymous city, a pair of stressful jobs, and a trusting wife was all they had needed to finally come together. A quick phone call of "Sorry, Laura, I'm going to be late at the lab again" had worked to cover each of the purely platonic meetings, so the night at the bar that had somehow found them back at Sally's place was already covered and accounted for.

She wrapped her arms around him, pressing into his thin chest, and tried to stop thinking about all of the reasons that this was a bad idea. A pale hand running through her hair was mentally narrated with _Lestrade can never find out about this, or anyone at the Yard_. Both of them scrambling to unbutton her work shirt were accompanied with _His marriage and both our jobs, on the line because of a stupid fling_. His lips on her neck were met with a gasp of "Don't you dare leave a mark."

But each of those thoughts, and all of the ones that followed, were brushed aside in the heat and sweat and pressure and slap of skin on skin.

-/-

-/-

The first time that Sally Donovan kissed Darren Anderson after his divorce, their teeth knocked together and his lip split. Neither seemed to notice until they tasted salt.

He and Laura had been in proceedings for months, and living separately for even longer, so the piece of paper did not really change matters at all. Laura had shouted at Sally plenty, screamed at the two of them, and slammed the door on her way out, but the passage of time had even cooled that reaction somewhat. If anything, the final portion of the divorce had gone more smoothly than anything else.

But when Sally had entered his flat, the trip from work only interrupted to grab a cheap bottle of wine on the way, the air had felt different. He sat on his bed, still in the suit from court, starring at the floor. The cuffs of his shirt had been adjusted and readjusted constantly over the course of the day, the slight trail of road salt and gravel from the door to the bedroom showed that he had walked home, and Sally wondered when she had picked that up from the Freak: the need to break down those around her into physical evidence. It was what she did for a living, of course, and it was what Darren did every day, but she had always been able to turn it off before. She looked at Darren and tried to remember to see a complete man.

She sat down next to him and they both fixed their gaze on the opposite wall. They finally had a chance to be together now. This was supposed to be a celebration.

The first kiss was the one that split his lip. It was a small cut, so they ignored it, too busy trying to consume each other enough to forget the painful path that had brought them here. The clothing was pushed aside, not even removed, and the sex followed the pattern of the kiss: hard and fast. This was what infidelity was about, right? So they might as well make the most of it. They had made love plenty of times before; this time they fucked. She had to stop herself from trying to figure out where he had eaten dinner going by the parting of his hair.

It wasn't until afterwards that it started to feel normal again. They lie still on top of the sheets until their breathing returned to normal. Darren slid her starched work clothes off of her and pulled the blankets up over the two of them. The cut had dried and was only a bit swollen. She ran a finger over his lips.

"The Freak's gonna have a field day over this."

"Well, good thing that it's none of his business then."

For what felt like the first time that night, they actually looked at each other.

This wasn't about Sherlock. It wasn't about Laura. It wasn't about Lestrade, or the CDI, or anyone at the Yard, or the lab, or anyone else in all of London.

It was just the two of them, together.

-/-

-/-

"He's got another press conference tomorrow. Lestrade actually went and got him the hat. Can you pry yourself away from the lab for an hour?"

"Wouldn't miss it for the world."


	13. Technician's Holiday

Lestrade couldn't figure it out. It just didn't make any sense.

The document full of dates shone out of his computer screen. It listed the duration of the cases that had passed through his division, from the moment they were reported, through the investigation, the gathering of the evidence, the receiving of the results of the lab work, the arrests, the interrogations, the bookings, the trials, and finally the convictions. There was no formal demarcation for when Sherlock had started working with his division, but the numbers told the story.

The time between discovery of the crime and the arrest of the suspect had dropped dramatically, astoundingly. Sherlock opened and closed cases in days or weeks that would have otherwise taken months. The conclusions fell out of him quick and precise, and Lestrade had yet to see one proven wrong. That side of the numbers made sense.

It was everything else that was off. Every other part of the process had slowed down. Lab work was delayed by days, even weeks. Clerks and legal assistants dawdled on any case that Sherlock touched. Paperwork was lost and found again multiple times, or just pushed aside and ignored until someone raised hell. Their lightning detective had turned everyone else into snails. And he just couldn't figure it out.

He mentioned the pattern to Donovan, and she looked away. He asked Dimmock about it (in passing, trying to be casual) and it didn't sound like any other DI's were feeling the slow-down. He mentioned it to Molly, and she blushed, and even looked a bit sad. It wasn't until Anderson overheard him mentioning it that he finally got his answer.

"It's because he makes everyone feel like shit," he said, stepping into the conversation between Lestrade and the assistant mortician. "And abused technicians don't tend to work fast."

The assistant coughed loudly and used it as an excuse to escape. Lestrade put his hands on his hips, meeting Anderson's glare.

"Are you saying that your lot is stonewalling me on purpose?" Anderson just snorted.

"Not consciously. But you really think that a busy forensic criminalist with thirty samples backed up is going to hurry in order to please the squad where they'll be insulted no matter what they do?"

Lestrade didn't have an answer for him. Anderson kept talking, his words fast and heavy, as if he expected to be cut off at any moment.

"He has critiques for everyone from entomologists to clerks of the court. No one can ever do their jobs well enough for his standards. And if he thinks he can do it all by himself, why not let him?"

Anderson was building up a real head of steam, his face starting to redden as he gestured forcefully in front of him.

"Dimmock comes down here and treats the technicians with respect. At crime scenes, Baynes is nothing but polite. Gregson sends out Christmas cards, for Christ's sake: red for the field analysts, green for the lab analysts, and silver for the secretaries and clerks! Any work on a Lestrade case, on the other hand, will be met only with disdain."

"Hey, now, I have always been incredibly kind to my support!"

"Oh, yes, kind enough to let them take all of the crap from your golden boy!"

The moment stretched out in silence. Anderson shifted on his feet, while Lestrade stood still, watching him. Anderson said his final piece in a much quieter tone.

"We are scientists. We've worked hard to get here, and we do our jobs to the best of our very high abilities. Just make him act like it every now and then."

And he walked away, back to his busy load of work.

-/-

-/-

The slow-down did stop in time, although Lestrade knew it came at far too high a cost. He still didn't believe any of it, any of the sewage the newspapers were spewing. Sherlock couldn't have faked it all. If anything, one of the techs would have found him out. But all of Sherlock's cases continued to hold up, even under all of the fire.

Lestrade had lost some of his spark. He didn't have his golden boy anymore, and the world did not make as much sense, could not be parsed as quickly. The numbers on his charts rebalanced; longer investigations flowing into quicker results. Their closure rates went down, but fewer of their convictions were overturned on technicalities. Life in and around the Yard returned to the way it had been, before a brilliant amateur detective had blown through like a hurricane. Nothing seemed to have changed.

Except that the Christmas following the incident at St. Bartholomew's, there was one more red envelope pushed through Darren Anderson's mail slot then there had been the year before. At the same time, one extra blue envelope found its way to Gregory Lestrade's doorstep.


	14. Policeman's Break

(A/N: This piece serves as a sequel of sorts to the previous drabble, "Technician's Holiday".)

-/-

-/-

It was starting to fall apart. It hadn't all come crashing down yet, no dramatic pronouncements or huge reveals to be heard, but the whole situation was starting to show its cracks. Stories weren't holding up to scrutiny like they had first seemed to; contradictions and inconsistencies started to pop up; easy answers became harder and harder to defend. The condemnation of Sherlock Holmes was starting to raise questions.

He couldn't have faked all of those crimes, not really. There were places he just could not have been, people he could not possibly have known. What records he had left ran consistent with the doctor's stories, and no evidence left over in the labs could be found to be a fake. Suspicious alibis started to crumble around other people, though, and no one seemed to remember working on any shows with Richard Brooke. An innocent little girl and little boy were still in therapy, but different events and memories were breaking through the fear and the hysteria. Not to mention the strange things that came up in their blood tests, only to have the results whisked away by men in black suits.

The case against Sherlock Holmes had not completely fallen, and his final act did read as a statement of guilt. But even the most ardent of his accusers felt the doubt creep into their minds.

Which was why Darren Anderson found himself avoiding the eyes of Detective Inspector Lestrade in the break room that day. He had meant to just grab a cup of coffee before he headed back to the labs, perhaps say hello to Sally on his way. But the sight of the DI bent over a copy of the paper, picking at a muffin, slowed him to a crawl as he bounced back and forth between wanting to say something and wanting to get out as fast as possible. The newsprint title screamed out "Boffin's Fans Take Their Message to the Streets", and the pictures showed walls covered in graffiti.

"They really cared about him."

Damn. Lestrade just had to go and start a conversation.

"Yes, well, people do enjoy hero worship."

It came out sharper than he had intended, a barb of a comment. Lestrade didn't look up from his paper, and let out a dry sort of chuckle.

"True enough. If they had known him, who knows how many could have stood him at all…he was an incredibly unpleasant man."

But not a guilty one. They both knew it, though it had taken Anderson the extra months to get there. The two of them had helped drive an unpleasant, petty, childish, greedy, cruel, mean, nasty _innocent _man to his death. Lestrade's jaw was clenched as he read the stories of the anonymous artists, proclaiming their support on the walls of London. Anderson took a sip of his coffee, and tried to be gentle (something that didn't come too naturally).

"The labs certainly feel like they're missing something. Everything stays where it's supposed to."

Lestrade looked like he was going to crack a tooth with his jaw clenched that tight. Anderson took it as his cue to exit. He wasn't going to be the one to wear his emotions on his sleeve. Of course Lestrade was more broken up about it; he had lost his golden detective, and his friend. He had to be torn apart with all sorts of guilt. But not Anderson. He stood by his previous decision, stood by his process, and stood by his work.

And he hadn't even liked the man.

No, Darren Anderson's feelings were not for the Yard. They were saved for at night, the dark hours when he lay awake next to a peacefully sleeping Sally, and wondered what it said about him that he didn't feel that guilty.


	15. Empty Holmes

John had plenty of time to look over the article. Nothing to do in a brand new empty flat but read your dead mate's life story. He wanted to say he wished he had heard them from Sherlock, but that wasn't what their friendship had been about. They had not dwelled in the past. John had not waxed poetic about his life before Afghanistan, and he hadn't expected Sherlock to spill his stories either. They had had enough to deal with in the present.

But there were a few things that probably should have born mentioning. For example, John has always just assumed that Mycroft was his only sibling.

Apparently Mycroft was just the only sibling that still talked to him…

**-/-**

**Sherrinford**

Ford was the normal one. The one who was born without what Mummy sometimes referred to as "The Scan". That borderline supernatural ability to look over a thing and know it in an instant. He was a bright child, an intelligent adolescent, and a cultured and composed man, but never a genius.

It would not have been quite so bad if he had not been the oldest. With each passing year, each of the younger siblings gained intellectual ground on him, before passing him in turn. Some, like Hortense, had been kind enough to let it go without mention. Sherlock had had no such qualms.

Ford had last seen Sherlock at Mummy's funeral. The brilliant young man, the pride of the extended family, and he didn't have the decency to show up straight. His fingers had ghosted over the covered track marks beneath his suit, he struggled to stand upright, and Ford couldn't stand to look at him. Couldn't stand to see all that potential wasted.

He had left London. Settled down out in the country, started a small little career in retail. It wasn't challenging, not to someone raised in the Holmes' household, but it was pleasant, and he liked talking to people. He got on with a coworker of his, proposed after a year of dating, and had a quiet little wedding at her family's farm. Mycroft was invited, but was unable to come; Hortense was his fiancée's maid of honor; a year later, they named their first (adopted) child Lenora. With all the madness in the Holmes' blood, he wasn't going to risk it with his own children.

And a small, silent part of him was glad when he didn't have to put up with the Scan.

**-/-**

**Lenora**

Mummy played the cello, but Lenora was always drawn to the double bass. She loved to feel the vibrations traveling from the strings, through the wood of the instrument, through her entire body. She would play for hours on end, filling the house with rumbling low notes and calming the chaos in her mind.

Lenora Holmes noticed everything. Everything. She could read her two older brothers' days in the parting of their hair when they came to supper. She could tell which stories the little ones would want before bedtime by the way they drank their milk. She could tell if anyone had set foot in her bedroom, even bumped into the door, because of all of the million little things that would be wrong, and how did everyone else deal with it?

Sherrinford was too stupid to notice all of the madness going on around him, but Mycroft could tell; she could see it in his eyes and the knot on his school tie and the way he polished his shoes before bed every night. Neat and precise and organized, like she wanted everything to be. Like she was achingly aware it wasn't. Her little brother noticed too, but he didn't care. Sherlock saw all of the chaos, saw how much order was needed, but he preferred to let the madness persist. As long as he could figure it out, it didn't matter how much disarray it was in. He played the violin with a reckless abandon; he didn't need the notes to make sense.

Despite all of the rifts and divides it would cause in later years, her death had nothing to do with anyone else; not her passive Daddy or bipolar Mummy, not the older brothers who couldn't save her nor the younger siblings who barely knew her. When she held the syringe in her hand, full of precise amounts of toxins and sedatives, her thoughts were only focused on getting a moment of peace. She had dressed in her favorite outfit, left her note in plain view, made everything about her choice clear.

One little boy was disappointed: there was no mystery in it.

**-/-**

**Hortense**

She went by Professor Holmes these days. She had spent long enough getting her job, she felt she was free to brag about it in her title, just a bit. She spent her days trying to pound a bit of logic into the minds of glassy-eyed students, and her nights at her desk, scrawling pages of theorems and calculations, trying to extend the reach of mathematics and logic just a little bit farther, to explain the world just a little bit more. Her notebooks had always been her solace.

After Lenora had gone, she was the last girl, the youngest in a family of active minds and sharp tongues. No one cared what happened to the two littlest Holmes children; Daddy was too busy gushing his feelings into his novellas and Mummy was trying to play double bass parts on the cello. Sherrinford was already half out the door and Mycroft was well on his way to greatness. Sherlock was busy shooting up cocaine in his room. Her drug of choice had been ketamine; at sixteen, she discovered that God was made of numbers.

It was the build-up university that actually got her to clean up her act. A little order was just what she needed; she wanted to work inside a structure for a while. Ford called her on her desire for a fancy degree, and she couldn't pretend otherwise. Sherlock was busy getting kicked out of every school he went to, but she knew how to slip under the radar, how to be polite enough to get past the idiot teachers and get to the real meat of the subjects. She also knew how to specialize; she didn't need to be a master in everything, her head just didn't have that much room. She wasn't Lenora. Sherlock deleted things, while she just chose not to learn them in the first place. She had her numbers and that was all she needed.

Numbers and a clean break. She kept in touch with Ford, but he was an entirely different entity, a breed apart. Every now and then she would walk the streets of London and say hello to the open air; Mycroft was sure to get that. She visited Lenora's grave every year. And after that dreadful business that was all over the papers, she visited his grave as well.

Her students occasionally asked her if she was related to the web detective. She told them to keep their eyes on their papers.

She had learned to specialize.


End file.
